3 Points: Real Salt Lake breaks 2 club records with 2-0 win over San Jose
3 Points: Real Salt Lake breaks 2 club records with 2-0 win over San Jose
Beleaguered by injuries and a road-heavy opening slate, RSL has shown circumstances are what you make of them with the best start to a home schedule in franchise history.
Good morning, and thank you for spending part of your day with 3 Points, the official post-match newsletter of the Salt City FC podcast.
How does it feel to wake up as the second-best team in Major League Soccer? Pretty good, RSL fans?
Last night was a match for the ages. Jefferson Savarino scored his first goal in his first start since returning to Real Salt Lake, and Zac MacMath earned his sixth clean sheet of the season to guide RSL to a 2-0 win over San Jose to clinch its best start at home in franchise history Saturday night at another sold-out Rio Tinto Stadium.
With the win, RSL moved to 8-4-4 on the year, including 6-0-1 at home and 28 points, just two behind LAFC for the top of the Western Conference (and the league).
Marcelo Silva opened the scoring for Real Salt Lake, finishing off Tate Schmitt’s pass from a corner kick in the 22nd minute to give the hosts a lead they wouldn’t relinquish through a dominating first half.
The Uruguayan center back scored his second goal of the season with the touch, one fewer than central partner Justen Glad for an RSL back line that has been lethal in the attack through the first few months of the 2022 campaign.
It was the eighth goal from an RSL defender this year, which was two more than the Salt Lake forward pack — if that means anything.
RSL slowed down the second half, but Savarino did not.
The Venezuelan international pressed for a goal, and finally converted his opportunity with his final touch of the match in the 81st minute.
That’s when Savarino, with his name on the board to be subbed out for Anderson Julio, out-paced a defender in the box, used every inch of his right foot to corral a ball over the top, and with the same leg put a shot on goal that caromed off the far post to double Salt Lake’s advantage.
It was Savarino’s first MLS goal since November 2019. And it was exactly the reason why RSL brought him back from Atletico Mineiro in Brazil.
Yes, Savarino has his swagger back. And Real Salt Lake is back to being one of the better teams in the West — and possible all of MLS.
Here are three thoughts from a cathartic, dominating win of a West rival, and the full arrival of a new challenger in the league.
Total Football: it starts in the back
Defenders are scoring, and attackers are defending. The era of position-less soccer is upon us, and Pablo Mastroeni seems to be the mastermind.
It’s not just the defenders who do attacking things; much of RSL’s game plan starts with the forwards putting in defensive work, as well. Take, for example, Savarino.
While everyone was focusing on his incredible goal — one that three years previously, he might not have been able to control, direct and deflect off the far post (and that is said with all due respect and knowledge of how much better Savarino is now than in 2018) — the 25-year-old winger was showing off his defensive skills, too.
Sprinting back to force a turnover. Tracking back on a breakaway. Savarino was everywhere, and calling him an “attacker” is something of a misnomer.
The Maracaibo, Venezuela native didn’t just lead his team with three shots and two on target, or the all-important second goal, or the corner kick that sprung the first marker. He also passed at a 66% clip. He won 12 duels, which was second on the team to only Justin Meram.
He did all this, played an astonishing 82 minutes, didn’t concede a single foul, and was caught offside just once — when he put the ball into the back of the net before VAR (rightfully) called it back.
Savarino didn’t just score Saturday night. He took over the game. He did exactly what RSL needed him to do when they signed him to a Designated Player contract, taking the game by the scruff of the neck, converting goals in tight spaces, and galvanizing his team and a sold-out stadium for the seventh consecutive match for another clutch three points during an unbeaten home start.
“It was a huge night for him,” Mastroeni said. “A lot of people don’t realize the amount of pressure that the media has put on him now that he is back on this team. It’s an immense pressure that not a lot of people can carry, but I think he showed his quality on both sides of the ball tonight. He does so many top level things when he has the ball and also has a strong buy-in to do the defensive work.
“I can’t imagine a more complete game from him and to get it tonight in front of the fans was special. I couldn’t be happier for him.”
History in the making
Real Salt Lake did something unseen before with Saturday night’s win, and that wasn’t just easily dispatching a foe that has consistently given them trouble in the Western Conference.
With the fourth win in the past five games, RSL improved to 6-0-1 at home, matching the best-ever home start to a season in club history. The Claret and Cobalt is also one of just two teams in MLS without a blemish at home, and the only in the West (Philadelphia is the other).
The RioT is a Fortress once again — and the fans responded in kind, with a new club-record seventh-consecutive sellout.
And yet Mastroeni knows that his team has so much work left to be done. Breathe in, enjoy the moment — and by Monday, get back to work.
“It validates all the work we have put in starting last year and then going into preseason,” he said. “This week in training we had several guys communicating very well with each other. To sit back and watch these players take accountability for every aspect of their game has been a great thing to see. The work we have been doing Monday through Friday is being validated on the field.
“It’s a great way to start but we have a long way to go and it’s on us to maintain that level.”
RSL is in second place in the league, only two points behind West-leading LAFC, and eight points clear of the playoff line as the summer months officially hit MLS. More importantly, they’ve built up that cushion as the schedule is about to congest even more, with seven games in the next month (and fortunately, four of them at home).
A good place to be — but again, plenty of work to do.
“As far as where we are in the standings, like Marcelo [Silva] said, it’s all about maintaining that humility. Regardless of the results,” Savarino said in Spanish. “Right now we’re in second place but who knows we might drop in the next game, and we have to get three more points.”
O Captain(s), My Captain(s)
Somewhat lost in the unfortunate, ill-timed injury to RSL talisman and team captain Damir Kreilach has been the way vice captain Marcelo Silva has picked up the armband and rallied the team in the image of Mastroeni — and, in some ways, Kreilach himself.
With the team needing his leadership, the 33-year-old Uruguayan center back is having his best season in ages. He scored his second goal of the year Saturday night, which is tied for the most he’s scored in a single season since 2010 (he’s done it two other times). It’s also the fourth goal in his time with Real Salt Lake, the most he’s scored with any club in his career.
And he’s done it all while wearing the captain’s armband, and while at times feeling inadequate to fill the shoes of the fast-rising club legend Kreilach.
“I’m a captain because of the circumstances with Damir being injured. But anytime you wear the captain’s armband it’s an extra responsibility to your team and how you play,” Silva said. “But I just want to make sure it’s clear that it’s really Damir that’s our captain. When he gets back, he will be our captain as he always has been.”
Maybe so. But Kreilach would be proud of the effort being demonstrated by the current captain in his absence.